Donald Love is set to leave SAFC and join Shrewsbury Town. How will we manage without him?
In other news, George Honeyman will continue as captain this coming season. Jack Ross explained his decision. “The on-field role is one that intrigues me because I think people overestimate the influence you can have on the park as a captain, especially in a noisy stadium,” he said. “I think it’s [about] about the standards you set every day, how you conduct yourself, the example you set for the players at the club. Then it’s about the players you’ve got around you, and George has got lots of good ones. Glenn Loovens, Grant Leadbitter, he had Lee last season. He’s grown into the role. I’m quite comfortable in that regard.”
After a week and a bit concentrating on fitness levels, Jack Ross takes his players for a run out against South Shields tonight. “The players have worked hard over the last seven or eight days,” he said. “Their conditioning levels have returned, and we have pushed them as hard as we can. We’ve taken them to points where they’ll need to be at stages throughout the season and I think that’s important. There’s a great variation in work you do in pre-season now and I think that’s important to keep it fresh, but we’ve done some of the same things as last season. To date, I think they’ve enjoyed it. It hasn’t been easy for them, but they’ve worked incredibly hard throughout pre-season so far and I think they’ve felt the benefit of it. The significance of pre-season friendlies can be overestimated or underestimated – that usually depends on how the results goes. Very obviously, it’s about us getting back on the pitch again in a competitive game. We will train on Thursday before playing the game at night and we will use two teams for 45 minutes so there’s no surprise for those attending. We will field two strong teams depending on the players we have available to us and it just gives the lads a taste of being back on the pitch against an opposition who will treat the game properly.”
